Lightning Lemonade
by DarkStarShadow
Summary: Sequel to Strong Enough, set after Soul Specter. Chip visits Madison at her home, and they talk over lemonade. ChipMadison.


It had been less than a day after Gnatu and Spidex had been defeated, and Madison decided to enjoy the long-awaited end of work at the Rock Porium with a large pitcher of lemonade on her front porch. Vida was off at Rootcore training, and her mom was still at work, so Madison had the entire place to herself. Madison laughed lightly to herself as she poured herself a glass from the pitcher; Vida had finally decided to work hard for her magic, it seemed.

She looked around quickly before pulling out her wand and using it to change out of her work clothes and into a casual long skirt and tank top to escape the summer heat a bit while sitting on the patio. It was peaceful until she heard a familiar sound, the sound of somebody tree traveling. Suddenly, Chip flew out of the tree in the yard, still in his work uniform. Madison jumped up and walked over to him, dusting him off as he got up.

"Vi said you'd be home." Chip commented with a grin. "And I figured, 'Hey, if we can use trees to go from Rootcore to Rock Porium, that we could use them to go from Rock Porium to anywhere with a tree."

"Interesting."

"One day, I'm gonna test this out and try to travel around the world using just trees! What a way to cut down on travel time!"

"Chip…you should be worrying about now." Madison replied as she walked him up onto the porch.

"Ooh, lemonade! Did Vida tell you I was coming?" Chip asked.

"Oh, um…no, but if you want some, I'll get you a glass. Stay there." Madison walked inside. Chip sat outside and mused a bit as he stared up at the clouds, then he looked down and saw his pin.

"There you are!" He exclaimed, picking up the pin.

"Oh, sorry Chip. I've been meaning to give that back to you." Madison replied as she walked out onto the patio with a frosted mug. She used her wand to make the water travel from the pitcher to his mug.

"Thanks for finding it for me," Chip replied, placing the pin back where it normally sat. "and thanks for the drink. Toby worked me so damn hard today…"

"I noticed. Unpaid overtime."

"For us zipping out to save the world. Don't worry, he'll snag the lot of ya by the time he's done."

"Oh boy." Madison said, taking a swig of her lemonade.

"As a knight-in-training, such things do not bother me, for they only make me stronger." Chip replied in a serious tone.

Madison smiled a bit, then took a drink from her glass. "Um, so…what brings you here?"

"Well, Vida told me that you were worried about me, so I came over to see how you were and to show you that I'm fine. I'm just a bit more eager to hit the hay today."

"Good, good to hear." Madison was thankful that she had been working on her nervousness with Vida training her, or else this meeting would've been worse than the last one.

Chip smiled as he looked at his pin with glee. He was happy to have it back.

"So Chip…what makes that pin so special?" Madison asked.

"What makes it special? Why, it's the Flash's symbol, of course! It gives me the speed of lightning to do all the work I do. Ever since I lost it, I've been feeling a bit tired and worn down, but now I feel all ready to fight some Hideacs." Chip replied.

"The…Flash…?" Madison asked.

"Oh, he was my first favorite comic book hero slash idol. He's kinda stuck on me a bit over the years, even though I moved on and they dropped his legitimate comic line years ago and replaced it."

"Oh." Madison said. "What's he like?"

"Well, I'm undoubtedly biased towards liking the 'Modern Age' Flash, Wally West, so I'll give you his story."

"There's more than one Flash?"

"Four of them, actually. They cut Wally's comics short a few months ago, sadly…" Chip sighed. "but anyways, yeah. Four Flashs, and Wally's my favorite. He was kinda like the underdog of all the Flashs, with his powers constantly failing him or driving him to extremes to maintain them…they nearly killed him at one point! But he kept on, and eventually, he got over his fears and broke through the troubles and he became one of the greatest superheroes ever!" Chip's excitement broke into a frown, and he flatly added, "If anybody tries to convince you that Superman is the greatest hero ever, remind them of Superboy-Prime and Superman's immense lack of care in regards to Jimmy Olsen." He took a sip of his lemonade and sat back in his chair.

"You seem to care a lot about the Flash, in regards to superheroes, that is. Why is he so special?" Madison said, crossing her arms.

"Well, the Flash was the first hero I ever wanted to be. My cousin used to call me Wally, and he made me a Kid Flash costume for Halloween…you remember that one?"

"It was the first time you ran around the school in a superhero costume." Madison joked. "Of course, you still haven't grown out of it…"

"Hey, I look good in spandex." Chip commented. Madison choked on her lemonade a bit. "Are you okay?"

"Seed." Madison lied as she pretended to spit out a seed into a napkin she conjured up.

"Oh, good. I'd have to give you the Heimlich, and I'm not all that good at it." Chip replied.

"Okay, all better. Sorry about that. Go on now…" Madison sat at attention.

"I…haven't driven you insane yet?"

"Not at all."

"Well, Wally reminded me of myself, ya know? He was just an ordinary kid who was given these amazing powers to run as fast as he wanted to, and he used them to fight crime and evildoers. I kinda started shunning him when I got into fairy tales and medieval tales of dragon slaying and knights and stuff, but ever since I became the Yellow Ranger, I've started going back to those old books I have in my closet and reading them…I even went out of my way to find the pin my cousin gave me for good luck."

"It must mean a lot to you, then…"

"It does. It does mean a lot to know that I'm kinda living a childhood dream, no matter how dangerous it is."

"Mmm…" Madison didn't know hoe to reply; she didn't have any childhood dreams that she could think of that she had done so far. She just sat quietly and drank her lemonade, as did Chip.

After a few minutes, Madison looked up. "Chip?"

"Hm?"

"What hero do you think I'd be?"

Chip grinned. "Oh, I though you'd never ask. I've thought about it for a while, and I kinda thought of who everybody in our group would be. I would obviously be the Flash, Xander would be the strong and sometimes evil Superman, Vida would be the fierce Hawkgirl, Nick would be the broody Batman, and you would be the wondrous Wonder Woman, of course!"

"Wonder Woman? Why Wonder Woman?"

"Well, you're a lot like her. First off, I can guarantee you that if you wore a Wonder Woman costume, you'd look just like her."

"Really?" Madison blushed.

"Yeah! Are you kidding? Seriously. Anyways, you look the part, you're a lot more feminine than Hawkgirl, and you kick ass. And, to top it off, you're pretty good at making people tell the truth."

"Oh really now?"

"Well, you don't have a Lasso of Truth on you right now, but yeah."

"Well, we have some rope out back…"

"No, no! That's quite alright…last thing I need today are rope burns."

Madison laughed. "Guilty conscious?"

"What?"

"Never mind." Madison looked down at her glass, disappointed that her attempts to flirt were shot down in flames.

"Hey, cheer up, Maddie…" Chip said as he got up out of his chair. "It kills me and everybody else to see you like this." Chip walked up and hugged Madison while she was still in the chair. "Cheer up…please."

Madison blushed and stood up, letting him hug her better. She twitched a bit at first, but she brought her arms up to return the hug. "I'll try."

"Yes!" Vida shouted as she watched the scene unfold in Rootcore's crystal ball. "Yesyesyesyesyes!" Vida danced around until she spotted Clare looking at her. "What?"

"What're you doing with the crystal ball…?"

Vida quickly magicked away the image on the crystal ball. "Oh…nothing." She replied with a grin of fake innocence.

"Oh…kay…" Clare walked off, confused.

Vida grinned happily, then went back to the book she had been studying from beforehand. "I am such a great sister." She said as she skimmed the page.


End file.
